There are a bunch of good reasons not to go out for dessert.

There are a bunch of good reasons not to go out for dessert. It's late and you're too tired to walk. You don't need the calories. The marriage has been loveless for years and you don't need a forced march with your cellmate to exacerbate it. America's somethingest something comes on right after America's craziest something else and you could PVR them but then when would you watch Lost? Well, why do anything, Ebenezer?

It's hard to argue the cardiovascular merits of going for a dessert walk when the exercise results in butter and cream consumption. But with the difference you come out even.

Here's a great reason to go out for dessert: It's romantic. You know that ramble, where you walk all afternoon kicking leaves, holding hands (not too much, we don't want to make anyone gag), talking about marriage and kids and home ownership without the distraction of a computer constantly heralding the arrival of another unimportant email.

Toronto is honeycombed with interesting nooks beyond the tree lines of our own backyards. Isn't candy a good enough reason to go exploring?

Native New Yorkers will routinely go for an after-dinner walk and even queue up to buy a $2.50 cupcake at Magnolia bakery, the epicentre of a recent(ish) cupcake trend. These days it has become too touristy for locals.

The Cupcakery, at 1034 St. Clair Ave. W., east of Dufferin St., comes closest in this town to duplicating the product, if not the culture. Their buttercream is lickable and rich without being cloying. They feature a variety of genuine flavours: proper banana cupcakes with banana in the cake mix (though the frosting is flavoured with extract), caramel cupcakes filled with a cavity of slippery, copper bliss. A little farther east, there is a next-level playground fitted with a two-storey web of ropes. It's the perfect spot to spend an hour playing Spider-Man to burn off calories. Just follow Alberta Ave. north, through the parking lot to Glenhurst Ave.

Down in the Distillery District, at 55 Mill St., there's the chocolatorium Soma, with its vaulted ceilings and intoxicating scents. Behind glassed in rooms, chocolatiers handle truffles with gloved hands like Oompa Loompas toiling in Willy Wonka's lab. They also make some of the strongest, concentrated hot chocolate, steeped with cinnamon, ginger, orange peel, vanilla and a finishing mist of chili pepper heat. It may be too expensive to buy property or anything else in the Distillery, but the maze of cobblestone streets and ancient (by Toronto standards) factory buildings are as romantic a spot as any, for an after-dark make-out session.

Most of Toronto's luxurious, price-prohibitive restaurants offer desserts that range from $10 to $14. Sometimes it's fancy apple pie (Grace, 503 College St.), or genre-bending science experiments like crème fraîche ice cream made at the table with nitrous oxide (Colborne Lane, near King and Church, at 45 Colborne St.).

Amuse-Bouche (near King and Bathurst at 96 Tecumseth St.) offers beautifully composed cakes (espresso cake topped with white chocolate ice cream), tarts (plum clafoutis) and custards (a silky pistachio crème brûlée with a paper-thin shell) available as a tasting plate to share. Stopping in for sweets on a weekday evening is a great entry point to a place you might be nervous about dropping an entire paycheque on.

For an English-speaking town, there is no shortage of dedicated crêperies in Toronto: Crêpes à GoGo (18 Yorkville Ave.), Crepe It Up (in St. Lawrence Market), La Crêperie (55 Mill St., in the Distillery District). Bistros too, provide an opportunity for a sinful last bite in a romantic setting. Starting later in the fall, Tati Bistro (124 Harbord St., west of Spadina) makes wonderful crepes Suzette, thick with Grand Marnier sauce, and Batifole (744 Gerrard St. E., east of Broadview Ave.) serves crepes smothered in a Jack Daniels butterscotch.

As a dog lover, I'm always happy to find a perch where I can watch a parade of canines. The patio of Athens Pastries, on the Danforth just east of Logan Ave., is a great spot for this. I sat down there last week and polished off a whole plate of bougatsa, layers of flaky phyllo pastry filled with simple custard, during which I saw a Bernese mountain dog, a whippet who walked like a tap dancer and a great Dane.

Just south of Mount Pleasant Cemetery, an open strolling area every bit as beautifully wind- swept as High Park, is sweet shop Xococava, at 1560 Yonge St. They make great ice creams and decent churros, but it's their chocolate truffles that are precious. The most exotic (to me) is a chorizo truffle. No, there is no meat in it, but a flick of smoked paprika, and pork fat substituted for butter.

I'm not out to pad the pockets of Big Glucose. Going out for sweets is an indulgence, but it doesn't have to put us into a sugar coma. Why not stroll to the fruit stand for some of nature's candy? Bloor Fruit Market, at the corner of Bloor St. W. and Manning Ave., is open until 9 most nights. They also have some of the best berries in the city, at the best prices. Last week I got two heaping pints of luscious raspberries for $5. And it's right near Christie Pits.

Yes, we are all getting older. When I was a boy I could eat a box of cookies without thinking. As a young man I would dissect a Wunderbar so that I could savour the modified palm oil peanut filling from the soy lecithin emulsified chocolate. That way I could really enjoy my second Wunderbar with a mango Snapple.

These days, a single scoop of ice cream can send my heart racing and lips flapping like a manic Sean Penn. While many of the senses dim, sugar's effects have concentrated into the potency of a street drug.

But that's what the walking part of dessert is for. And it's why we share a rich dessert, if we have someone to share it with.

Toronto is just not a walking town. Many of us drive to work and forage within a three-block radius of our homes. But if going for a walk to get a slice of cake seems like too much trouble, why not just get divorced right now? Soon it will be too cold to move in any direction but under a heavy blanket. Right now it's leaf-turning, turtleneck-with-light-jacket weather. Seriously, how cute do you look in that turtleneck?

It's our responsibility to get out of our homes before they frost over again.

Postscript: In no way is this a comprehensive list of good desserts in Toronto. It would have been impossible to get to them all. An acquaintance mentioned a to-die-for white chocolate and blueberry strudel at Messis, 97 Harbord St., west of Spadina. We'd love your input. Please post your comments to let each other (and me) know about amazing desserts in your area.

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